Attending Vetted Fine Art, Antiques & Collectible Shows

October, 1999--In the Big Apple, October is high season for fine art and antiques shows. Recently, I spent an evening roaming the Tribal Antiques Show at the 26th Street Armory and an afternoon at the International Fine Art and Antique Dealers Show at the Park Avenue Armory.

I came home honestly impressed by the knowledge of the dealers and their generosity in sharing it. Especially at the more informal Tribal Show, all I had to do was ask a question. For the next 20 minutes, I would be given an in-depth, meaty answer explained with colorful stories of far away places.

The Park Avenue show was a fair amount more formal featuring dealers in fine English furniture, silver, Old Masters paintings, tapestries, etc. (To give you an idea of the tone: the show's special exhibition featured tiaras.)

However, as a Parisian dealer was letting me fondle a fine Maori classic period jade figure, I asked why he hadn't chosen to exhibit at the Tribal Show instead. He told me he did good business at the uptown show with its extremely upmarket clientele, but that he had formerly been on the vetting committee of the Tribal Show.

This launched a discussion of the vetting process for these major shows:

If a show is confined to a certain (albeit broad) field, then a panel of judges goes through every dealer's booth, item by item. Any object thought questionable--maybe not wrong, but just doubtful--is asked to be omitted from the exhibition. As the Oceanic dealer pointed out, rejecting an item raises the hackles of other dealers/friends and tends to make one lose popularity contests. However, it benefits the broader community of dealers exhibiting at the show, because troublesome pieces tend to get weeded out. The authenticity of items from vetted shows is not guaranteed by the show, but at least the potential buyer has the reassurance that the items have passed peer review. No dealer wants a bad newspaper article about a show he paid good money to attend.

If a show covers many different fields of connoisseurship--as in the Park Avenue show--then specific category experts are imported from various parts of the world to vet each different area. This type of specific vetting is an expensive process, so the shows cost even more to produce. As these costs are passed along, the dealers pay more for their booths, and the prices they expect tend to be top dollar.

What good is a vetted show for those of us just beginning to collect or not wishing to pay full retail?

A vetted show is a great place to learn. A fledgling collector can train his/her eye on high quality items that are received as "right" by the dealer community. Under intense peer scrutiny, dealers preen by exhibiting some of their best merchandise. Unlike a museum, knowledgeable people are at hand to answer questions. Go ahead and say: "Tell me about this piece." You don't have to try to look like an expert. Unlike a museum, items are priced. As a style point, the question about price should probably be your final question. And remember, if you're just browsing, it's good manners to drift away when another customer walks in with that rabid, I've-got-to-spend, gleam in the eye.

The dealers at vetted shows may charge a full price for their fine objects, but those prices still may represent long term value. One very experienced, wealthy art patron I know, walked out of the uptown show having added three fine objets to her admirable collection.

Jake Biddington works on The Street and is responsible for the
opinions & information in INVESTING. Young Jake, as he is known
within the virtual BIDDINGTON clan, views tangibles such as fine art, antiques and jewelry as stores of value as viable as stocks or foreign currencies. He sees these
items as another asset class in which to place one's money. To that
end he keeps price histories and charting information on various
categories of objects. He views some items as long term investments,
others as items for a quick trade--and he even sees some as short
sales.

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